NHL won’t suspend Ference for hit on Halpern

NHL Hockey Operations has decided not to suspend Bruins defenceman Andrew Ference for sticking his shoulder into the head of Canadiens forward Jeff Halpern during the third period of Wednesday’s Game 7 in Boston. Halpern was flattened to the ice on the play and no penalty was called. But the NHL did review the video and TSN reported they had a disciplinary phone call with Ference on Thursday morning.

The hearing was likely conducted by NHL VP Mike Murphy as Senior VP Colin Campbell does not rule on any matters concerning the Bruins since his son, Gregory, plays for Boston.

The league generally does not announce when it has merely fined a player and it is possible he was fined for the hit. Regardless, Ference will be available when the Bruins begins their second round series against the Flyers on Saturday.

Here’s how the play was seen and descirbed on NESN:

On the play, Halpern was skating deeper into the Bruins’ zone — near where Ference was standing — in anticipation of a pass from Lars Eller at the blue line as Montreal tried to cycle the puck down low. The pass was intercepted by Brad Marchand — some 30 feet from where Halpern and Ference were — and he skated the puck the other way. As Halpern went to turn and follow the play, Ference leaned into Halpern and caused his hard-capped shoulder pads to make contact with Halpern’s head.
Ference was fined $2,500 by the league last week for his single-figured gesture in Game 4 of the series at the Bell Centre.

Update: Here’s another angle from the Versus telecast. Can’t find the CBC clip, but the Hockey Night announcers were outspoken on Ference’s actions.

Interesting summer to say the least. For my money, JM an overrated, limited, unimaginative coach, but, he’s had success, so he’s probably not going anywhere soon. Not impressed with his ability to asses/exploit the talents of his less experienced players. True, Subban is going to be good no matter who coaches him, but, he is definitely being offensively stifled under JM. So too, are all the teams’ best offensive players. We don’t really know how good this team could be offensively, if they were unleashed. Under JM we will never get to find out. If the Habs falter under him next year, I hope he has a short leash, and they release him asap. He is technically, not PG’s guy, he is BG’s. Now that they officially lost Boucher, the possiblity of replacing JM with a non-french speaking coach is more likely, but, don’t hold your breath, and, we can kiss KM goodbye, because JM is not going anywhere just yet. Long story short, intersting summer coming up.

In any case, thanks for the great season. I guess the “system” played a huge roll in that, still, it would be nice to find out if they don’t really need it…Just saying